Credit Card & Loyalty
Shaping a co-branded credit card proposition for Barclays and Amazon — from card naming and design through digital KYC, instant issuance and loyalty-programme integration.
The challenge
A co-branded card between a major bank and the world's biggest online retailer has to satisfy two demanding masters at once. Barclays needed a card programme that met its regulatory, risk and lending standards. Amazon needed an experience worthy of a brand built on removing friction — where a customer decides they want the card and is spending on it minutes later, not waiting days for the post.
The tension was the brief: bank-grade onboarding rigour delivered at e-commerce speed. Every element — the name on the card, the application flow, the identity checks, the moment of first use, the rewards — had to work for both brands and, above all, for the customer.
Scope — what would make customers choose it?
The UK credit card market is crowded and rewards-literate — another cashback card wasn't going to move anyone. The scoping work dug into what would actually earn a place in the customer's wallet: the strength of the Amazon relationship, the rewards construct that made sense against the economics, and the moments in the journey where existing card applications lose people.
Shape — naming, design and the journey
Shaping covered the full proposition: the card's naming and design — carrying two major brands on one piece of plastic without either feeling diminished — and the end-to-end customer journey from application through first spend.
The onboarding flow was designed around digital identity: Onfido's document and biometric verification replacing branch visits and postal checks, so KYC could happen in minutes on a phone. Issuance ran on Visa rails, with the loyalty programme woven into the proposition rather than bolted on afterwards.
Solve — digital KYC and instant issuance
The hard delivery work sat in the onboarding and issuance stack: integrating digital identity verification into a bank-grade decisioning flow, satisfying Barclays' compliance and credit-risk requirements without breaking the customer experience, and enabling instant issuance so an approved customer could start spending digitally before the physical card arrived.
Scale — loyalty that kept the card top-of-wallet
Getting a card issued is one thing; keeping it in use is the business. The loyalty-programme integration tied everyday spending back to the Amazon relationship — rewards the customer actually wanted, earned on spend everywhere and redeemed where they already shopped. That's what turns a sign-up bonus chaser into a long-term cardholder.
Bank-grade rigour, e-commerce speed
Minutes
from application to approved and spending — not days
Digital KYC
document and biometric verification replacing postal checks
Instant
digital issuance ahead of the physical card
2 brands
a proposition Barclays and Amazon could both stand behind
Building something like this?
Card programmes, digital onboarding, loyalty — this is the work I do. Tell me what you're facing and I'll tell you honestly whether I can help.
